Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of information technology and more specifically to the field of high throughput optimized information and media object management normalization, mapping, and routing across incompatible information technology infrastructures and modalities for media object generation.
Description of Related Art
What has long been needed in the field of information technology art generally and the specialized field of real-time media object management is a throughput optimized, high-speed, dynamic and on-demand media object management system that addresses the many issues surrounding prior art systems and their inherent incompatibilities. More importantly, an improved dynamic media object management system is needed that enables compatibility between many proprietary vendor source modalities. It is also desirable to create a means to enable compatibility between the many types of media object reviewing and processing technologist workstations.
More preferably, a dynamic media object management system could be created that enables previously incompatible source media modalities and technologist workstations to compatibly communicate information in a way that establishes throughput optimized and high-speed communications of media objects between myriad types of text, image, audio, video, and audiovisual source media modalities. This capability is needed in many industries, which presently must hire expensive consultancies to design custom hardware and software solutions to accomplish it. Such purported solutions require further substantial investments in specialized and highly skilled technical services professionals who are capable of merging and adapting data from legacy systems into such newly designed hardware and software systems. In other prior examples, legacy systems also included at extra cost, quality control (QC) workstations to which all media was routed for manual user review and correction.
In the present age of increasing implementation of current-day information technology solutions, many legacy text, audio, image, and audiovisual or video systems already form the currently available infrastructure. Such legacy systems continue to produce, generate, create, capture, and communicate a wide variety of electronically embodied information or media objects that are available in and communicated through a variety of vendor-specific, vendor-proprietary, and/or industry-standard information formats. The large number of different types of such legacy systems and correspondingly large number of formats has resulted in many challenges due to the incompatibilities between such systems and formats. One particularly challenging area of incompatibilities is illustrated with respect to the medical imaging field of technology.
For example, computed tomography (CT) imaging, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and other digital and digitally manifested diagnostic imaging systems or modalities were introduced during the 1970s. Those legacy systems have since been and are presently confronted with the increased use of specialized and general purpose computing systems that are being used to capture, store, analyze, modify, and communicate such imagery and related information for a variety of medical research and clinical applications. The need to communicate diagnostic imaging studies or media objects between different legacy medical imaging systems and modalities, other associated software applications, more modern-day clinical software systems such as Electronic Medical Records (EMRs), and alternative research computing systems has been extraordinarily difficult.
In an effort to address these many difficulties in the medical imaging field of technology, the American College of Radiology (ACR) and the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) developed a vendor-independent standard for digital medical images that specified the file format and network protocol as well as the syntax of the associated information exchanged between systems. This Standard, designated the Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM), arose in an attempt to promote compatibility and standardize the exchange of digital information between diagnostic medical imaging equipment and systems vendors. More information is available at the internet website identified as “medical.nema.org”. This attempt to promote compatibility between such imaging systems also sought to promote the compatible exchange of information for clinical analysis, review, archival, and communications systems, which includes Picture Archive and Communication Systems (PACS) and other computing system workstations. See, e.g., “www.imagingeconomics.com/issues/articles/2005-05_01.asp” and “en .wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_archiving_and_communication_system”.
The DICOM Standard was generated to promote the compatible capture, storage, and communication of pixel data or data streams or media objects that represent each image within an imaging study as created or generated by an imaging device or modality. In addition to compatible capture, storage, and communication of such media objects, the DICOM Standard was also intended to address the compatible inclusion, appending, or combination of specific ancillary media object information regarding the image and the overall study being captured, stored, or communicated. For example, such ancillary data is preferably stored within what are referred to as DICOM Attribute Tags, which are combined, stored, and communicated with each media object or image or imaging study.
As a further example, the types of information that may be contained within DICOM Attribute Tags may also preferably include statistics about the medical imaging device or modality that generated the image and/or study. Such information may also include the modality's unique ID, the date and time when the images or study were taken, and/or name of the technologist or operator who performed the study. For certain types of medical imaging applications, such information may also include information on the procedure such as procedure code, biological tissue type and/or body part, institution where the procedure was performed, name of the physician who ordered the study or research, and the radiologist who is scheduled to read the study. Patient specific information may also be encoded within an image or study and contained within DICOM Attribute Tags such as patient name and identifying numbers, date of birth, sex, and other related data.
Despite the efforts to increase compatibility between such legacy systems, many vendors have availed themselves of the flexibility that was built into the DICOM standard. In the past, many organizations implemented vendor specific and exclusive installations. However, as the number of vendors and manufacturers of such systems has increased, such organizations have sought to create best-of-class capabilities by incorporating those elements of each vendor-specific system that offered the best performance and the most attractive cost. These efforts to establish customized, best-of-class installations, has resulted in the need to overcome incompatibilities between vendor-specific systems that implement a vendor-specific version of the respective DICOM standard through customization. This, in turn requires expensive investments in workstations for skilled QC technologists and/or skilled consultancies having the technical expertise to create such customized solutions that suit the requirements of the particular installation or user.
As a further example of the types of challenging incompatibilities that need to be overcome, imaging studies may be generated by a vendor-specific system that may incorporate a DICOM compatible, but vendor unique media object(s) containing image information and pixel data or image or image series representations.
In many more modern technologist and clinician data processors or workstations, or PACS workstations, the reviewer may create text-based and graphically-represented annotations that are also stored in the media object as ancillary information appended to the image information. Additionally, many such systems generate ancillary information that describes prior created media objects or imaging studies so that a technologist or reviewer may consider a temporal dimension in their analysis of such media objects. When communicated to the system or modality of another vendor viewing or analysis data processing workstation, the communicated media object may be displayed with such image information in an improper anatomical order, without the information related to prior created media objects and imaging studies, and with garbled or incomprehensible image and related ancillary annotations and information.
One reason for these challenges and problems stems from the flexibility that was built into the DICOM standard, and which allows for the use of vendor-specific, private, and/or proprietary DICOM Attribute Tags or ancillary information. The DICOM availability of such vendor specific tags was intended to define ancillary information that could be used for vendor specific purposes to facilitate internal communications within the vendor's product set. While this flexibility might have been of use to vendors, such flexibility has created obstacles to the goal of sharing compatible media objects such as diagnostic studies between different systems for the purpose of sharing medical records, including clinical Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems.
Many vendors have sometimes even created incompatibilities between different systems within their own product lines. Combined with the differences between products, systems, and modalities from different vendors, the DICOM standardization attempts have fallen short of the originally intended goals. This shortcoming amplifies the need for a means to enable compatible communication of media objects between such systems and installations.
In a more detailed example of the problems that stem from incompatibilities between vendor-specific versions of the DICOM standard, a particular vendor specific imaging system or modality may generate, capture, and/or create a media object that includes imaging as well as ancillary information such as: a study description, a modality code, and an organ code, among other information. Upon generation, the media object (images and ancillary information) is communicated to another viewing, analysis, and/or archival and storage system, such as a PACS data processor or workstation. After communication to the same-vendor PACS workstation for review and analysis by a clinician technologist, or radiologist, the same-vendor PACS workstation will ideally also automatically display historical and/or prior related media objects. Such PACS systems thereby enable the technologist, clinician, or radiologist to review historical information and images to consider changes in the images over a span of time.
The automated display of such prior generated media objects is only possible if the ancillary information of the prior-generated and newly communicated media objects is an identical match. Those experienced in the field of art may appreciate that this is impossible even in same-vendor installations having multiple same-vendor versions of similar imaging systems and modalities due implementation flexibilities afforded by these types of systems.
Such incompatibility is even more pronounced between imaging systems and modalities from different vendors. The challenges are even greater for users and installations that attempt to establish best of class facilities using the systems, modalities, devices, components, and equipment from many vendors. Another dimension of complexity is introduced where installations such as imaging centers and medical institutions attempt to collaborate or are required to share information subsequent to a corporate merger. Even within collaborating and/or co-owned facilities, use of slightly different nomenclature in the ancillary information can create incompatible attribute values or DICOM attribute tag values such that the downstream workstations or PACS workstation may not recognize related historical information.
In the continuing example of possible incompatibilities resulting from flexibility of the DICOM standards, many other DICOM specific issues create opportunities for improvement. One such opportunity includes the specific format compatibility for pixel and ancillary information data streams, which identify how an imaging study can be stored, transmitted, and communicated in a particular sequence.
Another such opportunity includes creating compatibility for ancillary information terms with regard to image series levels, which describe specific subsets of imaging series contained within a given image study to allow for reduced networking loads when accomplishing series level routing. Another opportunity and DICOM specific area for improvement where many incompatibility problems have been encountered includes the DICOM defined query/retrieve model levels, which those having skill in the area refer to as a patient or study root.
DICOM attribute tags also need a more compatible communications capability because vendor specific systems have the ability to generate updated ancillary information that is only visible on same-vendor systems but appear as empty and/or incorrect ancillary information in the created media objects o non same-vendor specific systems. This in turn creates errors in downstream, non same-vendor system or workstations that are receiving these media objects.
The DICOM standard has also seen short-comings in vendor-proprietary and specific implementations of what is referred to as compression and transfer syntax, which is supposed to be used by the imaging system or modality to enable communication to reviewing, analysis, and archival data processors and workstations such as PACS workstations. More often than not, however, such compatibility is advertised but unrealized, which usually requires expensive and time-consuming intervention by highly skilled service providers having the expertise to create a customized hardware and/or software solution to enable the required communication compatibility between same-vendor as well as installations populated with systems, modalities, and equipment from various vendors. Such customized solutions are also largely inflexible, as the introduction of updated same-vendor equipment and software or different vendor options requires yet more new and custom solutions.
Despite many attempts, modality, workstation, and information technology infrastructure manufacturers, service providers, users, and operators have been frustrated by the unavailability of high throughput and compatibility improving technologies and systems, despite the need for and possibility of improvements. The information technology market continues to seek a higher-throughput optimized, high-speed, real-time or dynamic media object management system.
Even more preferably, such an improved system should incorporate all of the advantages of the prior art while enabling compatibility across proprietary and previously incompatible vendor source modalities and workstations, while offering reduced costs of operation, greater ease of use, and more effective and time-saving media object management options. As used herein, the term modality is defined to mean any type of hardware and software device, component, equipment, machine, system, and combinations thereof that are capable of and/or used to create, generate, capture, modify, and communicate source media objects as discussed elsewhere herein.